Eating in Tokyo

There is nowhere in the world is food more readily available and reliably good.  From the grocery store, to the ubiquitous 7-11, to fine sushi restaurants, you can generally be assured of a good meal in Tokyo.  A friend who lived here for 17 years told me there was no reason to ever cook at home since good food was so conveniently available and inexpensive.  In three weeks, we've cooked dinner three times; twice was spaghetti and once was Thai food.

Typical Tokyo Restaurant

Restaurants almost never have English menus so you either order from the plastic display out front or from the pictures in the menus.  Both can be a little dicey and its easy to end up eating tongue or something less savory.  We generally eat sushi, BBQ or rice dishes for dinner and a variety of noodles for lunch (soba, udon or ramen).  A good lunch can be had for less than ¥400 ($4) and the receipt tells you the calorie count!

Plastic displays are very handy

Some are very detailed and realistic

Table-top BBQ with lots of sake

 Make no mistake you can easily drop $100 on a fantastic suhsi dinner with beers and sake, but it will be a meal you won't forget. I really can't believe how good the sushi is.  It  melts in your mouth and is very fun to eat!

Our neighborhood grocery store

We buy our food at a local grocery store called Peacock. It is about a 10 minute walk  form here. It is a lovely store, always impeccably clean and organized with a good selection of whatever you need (as long as you can find it).  The grocery store is also a great place to get dinner.

Take out meals from grocery stores are very popular

Lovely produce if you know what it is

For specialty food, toiletries or sundries we go to any number of little  streets lined with shops.  My favorite is the ¥100 Store (¥100=$1.00 exactly).

Typical street near our house for miscellaneous good